


Papilionaceous

by SprungSick



Category: Minecraft (Video Game), Video Blogging RPF
Genre: Flower Crowns, Flower time, Flowers, Gen, I got attached to a mental image and I couldn't let it go okay, I refuse to read my own shit because it makes head go :(, Just focus on the flowers okay-, LITERALLY, My other wips looking at this like, Not Beta Read, Set in minecraft, Something kinda fluffy? Shocking I know, They all have flowers thats it, Tommy-centric, Yeah it's not super deep, but that's not super important
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-18
Updated: 2020-11-18
Packaged: 2021-03-10 00:21:18
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,143
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27614777
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SprungSick/pseuds/SprungSick
Summary: Tommy finds flowers beautiful. He's in luck- the nearest flower was always just a person away.(In which they all can just grow flowers, okay? That's it, that's the fic-)
Relationships: Clay | Dream & TommyInnit (Video Blogging RPF), Dave | Technoblade & TommyInnit, Hippity hoppity get pedophilia off my fucking property, Jschlatt & TommyInnit (Video Blogging RPF), No Romantic Relationship(s), Toby Smith | Tubbo & TommyInnit, TommyInnit & Phil Watson (Video Blogging RPF), TommyInnit (Video Blogging RPF) & Everyone, Wilbur Soot & TommyInnit
Comments: 26
Kudos: 429
Collections: Completed stories I've read





	Papilionaceous

**Author's Note:**

> Hey! So I've been feeling pretty bad for the past couple of days and I needed to do something super self-indulgent and low-intensity to get back into the 'I like creating things' mood. 
> 
> This is what I did- 
> 
> This idea honestly came to me as a series of visuals, so I decided fuck it and wrote whatever. There's a storyline in there somewhere, oops

Flowers weren’t that much of a big deal. They grew on the skin, they wilted, they dropped. If anything, they were more like hair - a momentary beauty at best and a hate-inducing nuisance at worst. 

Tommy found them absolutely beautiful. 

*** 

Out of everyone in their town, he liked Tubbo’s the best. His flowers sprouted from his hair and forehead, the bright yellow almost encasing his skull in a bright yellow halo. Petals - long and reaching from a decently sized black center - remained steady in their refusal to shed. The iconic black-eyed susan. 

“Tubbo?” he had asked one day, mesmerized by how his friend’s flowers replaced the sun. 

“How do you handle it?” 

Tubbo had looked away from his palms, subsequently looking away from the gathered bees. Even as his face disappeared and reappeared behind the flying yellow bodies, Tommy could see the pure content in his friend. 

“How do I handle the bees?” 

It felt like fate, the way his friend blinked angelically as the sun framed his form. So bright, so gentle, so fitting of the near-indestructible flowers resting like a crown. Tommy nodded. 

“I mean, it’s pretty simple. All you have to do is be really gentle and they won’t do a thing. They’re quite nice in that way…” 

Tommy listened along, picking at the grass between his hands. Warmth pushed through his chest and out his face; he knew his smile had grown too genuine, but he didn’t really care. 

He admired how his friend emitted his own light. 

*** 

Wilbur was another person who grew flowers on his head. Solomon’s seals hid deep underneath his wild hair - their somewhat small bulbs lent themselves to being easily concealed. They only grew from his scalp, strangely. 

In the quiet moments of life, he would admire the bursts of white poking out from his friend’s hair. They were undoubtedly unique, subtle yet enhancing at the same time. 

In the heated moments of life, he would note how Wilbur would run his hands through his hair and rip them all out. How - as the stress shattered him to the point he screamed when he laughed - the cylindrical tubes found a home on the ground. How the remaining wilted and disappeared on their own. 

He hated it. 

As he slowly rebuilt himself, Tommy found joy in seeing fresh white blots in Wilbur’s hair. 

*** 

“Tommy, I just realized that I’ve never seen your flowers.” 

“Yeah, that’s for a reason.” 

“Oh? Shit, sorry, if it’s personal I can just stop talking-” 

“No no, it’s fine. I have them. I’m just still a minor and showing you mine would definitely be seen as not okay to some people.” 

“Fuck- okay, forget I asked. I do not want to see your dick.” 

***

If he had to say whose flowers he thought most unique, it would have to be Dream. Not because of the flower itself, no - the delicate amsonias matched oddly with his preferred green, but the star-like flowers appeared incredibly stereotypical. The placement was what caught him the most. Never before had he seen a person with flowers sprouting from their calves. 

Whenever Dream ran, his legs blurred blue. 

Realistically, it made sense. Preserving and caring for one’s flowers generally meant not wearing clothes on top of them. Dream, with his wardrobe exclusively comprised of shorts, was the perfect example of this; of course, they all could still see the trails of smashed flowers where he secured his armor. Yet the streaks of blue jarred him all the same. 

Tommy liked the effect. A lot. Just watching made him feel alive. 

*** 

“I’m sorry, can you repeat that? I really, really wasn’t focusing.” 

“God, Tommy - can you pay attention for one second?” 

“I can, I just choose not to. Well- most of the time.” 

“You good?” 

“Yeah, yeah. My flowers are just itching like fucking hell today. Fuckers should be grateful I haven’t pulled them all out.” 

“Tommy.” 

“Yeah?” 

“Your flowers shouldn’t itch. Like, at all. That only happens when they’re heavily harmed. It’s like an autoimmune reaction or something.” 

“Oh.” 

***

Techno didn’t show his flowers. He seemed almost embarrassed by them. 

When he saw trails of sprouts scrawled across Techno’s knuckles, they would be gone by the next day. When he caught a glimpse of the other’s ribs - a rare occurrence, but occasionally necessary - he would see stretching stems and bright red petals smashed beyond recognition. In a way, Tommy could sympathize. 

One day, he asked a question without thinking. 

“Can you grow out your flowers once? I know they’re kind of a hassle, but I’d like to see them.” 

After a week, Tommy noticed young vibrant spuds on Techno’s fists. He had grinned, cheered loudly, and complimented his friend on how beautiful they looked. 

Techno wore snapdragons on his last knuckles after that. 

*** 

Schlatt, despite his bravado and pointed teasing, had yellow covering his shoulders. Large, stable - perhaps a bit too large in comparison to the actual flower - they wrapped around his skin like a cape. A cape fit for a king. 

A couple of long streaks of gold crawled down his arms and stopped at his wrists. They protected his arms. He didn’t know what from. 

Tommy wasn’t sure how he felt about them. The goldenrods - so lustrous and light in their coloring - didn’t seem appropriate for him. He would have expected a darker color, something like a royal purple. Yet, oddly, they fit. 

They matched perfectly with his wide grin. 

*** 

“Jesus, I really need to take care of my flowers.” 

“How come?” 

“They’re so itchy all the time, it’s really getting on my nerves.” 

“Then, I don’t know, don’t cover them?” 

“Yeah, I probably shouldn’t. But it’s suspenseful now, right? So mysterious. ‘Ooo, what are Tommy’s flowers? How can they match such a big man like him?’” 

“Literally no one cares. Also, that’s a terrible impression.” 

“Shut up. You’re lucky I haven’t committed several crimes against you.”

***

He always had to pause when looking at Philza’s flowers. Which was often, seeing at he took good care of his flowers and wore clothes that left them exposed. 

On the back of his arms and shoulders, covering his skin with unparalleled density, was a mosaic of gardenias. 

They had always reminded him of wings - the thick petals looked too close to feathers to be a coincidence. Every time he looked the flowers would shift to a new position just slightly off where they should be; despite this, the silhouette remained the same. A silhouette of a large, protective shield. 

Frankly, Philza’s gardenias were enchanting. 

He remembers touching them once - with permission. They were soft, if slightly compressed due to the sheer amount packed across his back. He saw new buds poking their way through the wall of old. 

Although he never asked again, he could feel the light texture on his fingertips.

*** 

With his spirit too high and self-restraint too low, he made a promise. He looked to his friends, all with their sensibly placed spots of color, and told them he would join them soon. 

As predicted, no one really cared. 

Flowers, after all, were not important. They weren’t weighed with levity or laced with the secrets of one’s soul. Any power they carried came from the individual. Most individuals gave them no power at all. 

“Give me a couple of days to get them all pretty. But after that, I’ll bear them to the world,” he said. 

A couple cheered, a couple grinned, and a few rolled their eyes. Tubbo said something which sounded suspiciously like ‘about time’. They collectively moved on.

Eventually, the sun left and everyone decided to stop for the day. He found himself in front of his own little home, stone walls familiar and obvious in their inexperience. A part of him always grinned at the sight, at the exasperation the others had met him with. With an exhale, he stepped inside. 

He closed his blinds and promptly stripped. 

He winced. 

Looking at his own crushed flowers, regret crawled from his past actions. Or inaction. The simple choice of choosing not to care for them - of choosing to ignore them purely out of convenience - had left his flowers in a permanent state of disrepair. 

Maybe if he took care of them, they could look like Tubbo’s. Or Wilbur’s. Or Dream’s. 

Inexplicably, shame made its home directly in his brain. 

The loop of damage, then ignorance, then damage again had taken its toll. He knew he should have broken the loop, somewhere when the old flowers could have been saved. When his habits could have been changed. 

Instead of dwelling on the reality of the situation, he went to sleep. He knew he wouldn’t be leaving his house for the next few days. 

He woke up to a beautiful, shining sun. Damaged petals littered his sheets. 

When Tubbo came knocking at his door, he refused to let him in. It felt ridiculous, shirking his work to take care of something so small - yet the image of his dull, destroyed flowers assured him in his plan of action. With the door creaked an inch open, he told him to leave him be for a couple of days. And to find him more accommodating clothing. 

Thus began his days of regeneration. 

He never left his house. He paced and paced as he tried to find some form of entertainment. He checked his flowers constantly, plucking the ones without any chance to make way for the new. He spent time cooking, trying to fill the space. He brushed his own petals from where they scattered across the floor. He tried to read a book. 

That last one had been a new low. 

By the end of day three, he decided it was time to end his self-imposed isolation. His new buds were far from finished growing, the old still bending in odd places - yet he knew that if he spent another day alone, he would break everything he owned. 

He went to sleep hushing himself. It didn’t matter if he was a work in progress - no one would judge. 

Right? 

Everyone else had cared for their flowers beautifully. Even Halo - whose otherworldly origins remained unknown - worked with hands adorned in large anthuriums. Maybe a few had destroyed theirs, but only he had neglected his flowers so greatly. 

The next day arrived. 

He left his armor by the door, wearing only pants and a button-up shirt. The shirt’s patterning covered its own red in large white chrysanthemums - out of all the ones Tubbo brought him, this one seemed the least used. He wore it with irrational defiance. 

For some reason, he couldn’t open his door. 

All that he could see was his flowers, how sad they truly looked. They were nowhere near the vibrancy and size they had been when they first grew in. Even then, at age ten - a time where it was universally agreed upon that the immature flowers would look patchy and the slightest bit ugly - his flowers had looked better then. He hadn’t destroyed them then. 

His hand came to his face. He breathed in, then breathed out. 

There was - and always will be - the present. 

In the present, it was fine to be a work in progress. It was fine to be healing.

He opened the door. 

Outside, clouds shielded them all from the sun’s presence - a failed attempt apparently, seeing as the breeze that brushed against his face felt warmer than temperate. His lawn and small garden, despite being under his care, bloomed cheerfully. Looking past that, he could see the many structures that made up their town; no matter how hard they all tried, no one could coordinate well enough to make anything uniform. Satisfaction came at the sight of his own contributions. 

Just down the very path he had helped build, he saw his friends. Conversing lightly, they were gathered by the railing and peering down at the river below - a habit they had all taken to doing after a certain incident they would rather not repeat. No one noticed him. 

Them, with their swathes of bright color and lively plant matter. Them, with their lack of concern he wished he could match. Them, with their beautiful, beautiful, flowers which he loved to glance at and touch and appreciate. 

Him, who would soon be joining them. 

With one last breath he looked down, surveying his healing flowers. Destroyed by his hand, regrown by his hand. Too small, too dull, and too broken to be pretty. Too healed to be dead. Yet in a way, he loved them just the same. 

They were his beautiful, beautiful, flowers. 

He called out to his friends. Their heads shot up as he ran to meet with them, chest pounding and grin stretched so wide it nearly broke his face. 

Open to the world rested his red freesias, nestled firmly above his heart.

**Author's Note:**

> I had a lot of fun trying to describe everyone's flowers and such. I might draw it up or something, like create a ref sheet 
> 
> Anyways, I hope you enjoyed my disjointed brainrot- 
> 
> If I don't respond to your comment I'm really sorry. I'm still trying to get back into the swing of things and I don't know, stuff just ain't working. Please know that you aren't commenting into a void - I read your comments and they honestly really really make me smile. I've cried more than once because of them. You are appreciated, so much!! 
> 
> Stay safe y'all, drink water or smn


End file.
